Kirkus: “In a conflagrant climax overflowing with images of glory and wonder, Duane neatly manages to pull together and tie off plot threads that have been dangling since the earliest volumes.”
Nov 182015
November 18, 2015
Nov 172015
SFX Magazine: …Christopher goes deeper than pastiche. Ray’s primitive systems can only retain 24 hours of memory, so each day he’s a clean slate, briefed on the case by Ada – and it’s not clear he can trust her. This is wonderfully noir, leaving Ray slightly adrift between the forces trying to manipulate him. And in true Chandler style, Ray quickly becomes implicated in the very case he’s investigating, making things even knottier. Made To Kill is book one of a trilogy. We’d happily go for more than three.
Read the full Made to Kill review in SFX Magazine.
November 17, 2015
Nov 162015
Library Journal: Fans of unusual colony fiction such as Chris Beckett’s Dark Eden will enjoy the slightly surreal alien world Newman (Between Two Thorns) creates. Whereas many hard sf novels would wallow in the nature of the aliens and the process of getting to the planet, the real draw here is the character of Ren and the cost that keeping the colony’s secrets has on her mental health. Decades after landing on an alien planet, the colonists who live at the foot of the jungle structure they call God’s city maintain a yearly ritual. Only Mack, their leader, and engineer Ren know that this ritual is a sham. The colonists had followed the dream of the woman they call the Pathfinder, who was exposed to a spore while hiking with Ren and received a vision that drew her into spaceflight and to the alien planet. Things didn’t go exactly as planned, and now years later the stress of maintaining both this myth and the secret of what really happened at Planetfall will culminate in conflict.
November 16, 2015
Nov 162015
Booklist: The genre-blending trend takes an enjoyable turn in this hard-boiled-PI and science-fiction hybrid, which author Christopher describes in his foreword as being like “Raymond Chandler’s long-lost science fiction epic.” The year, 1965. The place, Hollywood. The world, alternate (JFK is still alive, and the Cuban Missile Crisis is just getting going). The citizenry is doubly captivated by the Cuban Missile Crisis and a big Hollywood premier. Enter our hero, Ray, a robot PI. Ray is the last robot left in a world that used to be dominated by them. He has recently been reprogrammed by his supercomputer boss, Ada, to be an undercover contract killer, but with only a 24-hour memory tape, Ray is not sure how or why this happened. When a sultry starlet comes into Ray’s office with an order to kill her leading man and a bagful of gold bars to cover the payment, Ray lands in the middle of an evil conspiracy with roots much deeper than the movie industry. The action, plot, dialogue, and characters are straight out of Chandler, while the science-fiction elements are reminiscent of the very best of that genre from the 1940s and ’50s (think Philip K. Dick and Robert Heinlein). This first in the L.A. trilogy is a fun, fast read for anyone willing to take the speculative leap—a must-add for most fiction collections.
November 16, 2015
Nov 132015
Boing Boing: Christopher really gets to grips with the constraints of Ray’s short term memory and the social implications of the mob-destruction of all the robots (save one), telling a story that’s gripping, funny, deadly and suspenseful.
Best of all, this is book one of three, so there’s more of this kind of thing in the pipeline. That’s great news, because Christopher has hit on something that I’d hardly suspected before, and now can’t get enough of.
November 13, 2015
Nov 122015
Tor.com: Beautifully and heartbreakingly wrought, Planetfall is a genius novel that is far more than its exterior belies; a distressing, harrowing novel that left a deep mark on me. It isn’t an easy, cheerful read, but it is a captivating story that can be very aptly be described as a must read.
November 12, 2015
Nov 122015
RT Book Reviews: Remarkable Harrison pulls out all the stops for this amazing new novel. This is a fantastic tale of friendship, love, loyalty and sacrifice that you won’t soon forget. Make sure you have a Kleenex nearby, for sometimes tragedy and loss are unavoidable. Without question, Harrison should be an auto-buy!
November 12, 2015
Nov 112015
Daily Mail: One of the most compelling things about the fantasy genre is the sense it gives of other realities existing a mere hair’s breadth from our own – its practitioners constructing not only plots but entire worlds in which for them to unfold.
Foreign Devils is an especially adept example of this. It is also what one can only describe as an historical thriller set in the future, the premise being that the Ruman (yes, Ruman) Empire has neither declined nor fallen but harnessed a literally demonic form of weaponry known as Hellfire.
We accompany Livia and Secundus Cornelius, scions of one of Rume’s oldest and most powerful families, on a diplomatic mission to Kithai (a brilliantly wrought cultural landscape that perhaps bears the same relation to China as Rume does to Ancient Rome).
But who are the remote Autumn Lords who hold sway over Kithai? And are they as benevolent as they’re made out to be? You’ll have to read this brutal, beautiful tale to find out.
November 11, 2015
Nov 112015
NPR: Made to Kill finds the common ground between [the hardboiled detective story and science fiction], and Christopher owns every inch of it . . . Made to Kill is the first installment of a planned trilogy, but it has all the potential of an open-ended series; knowing there are only two more Raymond Electromatic mysteries to come is the book’s only disappointment.
November 11, 2015
Nov 102015
School Library Journal: Henry’s life is complicated. His previous boyfriend committed suicide without warning or explanation. His jerk brother’s girlfriend is pregnant. His nana has Alzheimer’s. And his new boyfriend refuses to acknowledge their relationship, instead humiliating and attacking him publicly. Henry is also haunted by questions about why his father left and if Henry himself is culpable. This is all further complicated by the fact that he is regularly abducted by aliens who drop him off naked in various locations throughout the city. The aliens offer Henry the opportunity to save the world from obliteration by simply pressing a red button. The catch? Henry isn’t so sure it’s worth saving. Hutchinson’s voice rings true. This work effectively combines the best of elements of Nick Burd’s The Vast Fields of Ordinary (Dial, 2009) with hints of Kurt Vonnegut’s Slaughterhouse Five. VERDICT Angst-loving teens will devour this lengthy tome, yearning to see if Henry can consummate a new romance. Highly recommended.
November 10, 2015